Beer Trip

Took a beer trip to San Diego. First stop was Stone Brew. That place was amazing. First we had food which was a little bit hipster but still good. I guess I'm an old fashioned burger and brat kind of guy. Then we went on the tour. It was cool to see the large fermenters and such. They claim to be brewing beer 24/7. If I remember right they are the 10th or so largest in the US and they really didn't enormous or anything. It looked like they had 20 or so 100bbl fermenters. When the tour was over we sat and drank some more. The beer list they had was amazing. Beers I had only heard about. If we had known better we would have just stayed here all weekend.

Then we went to White Labs. One thing I really wanted to do was to taste the beer that was made using the same wort and various yeast. What I found really surprised me. The difference in taste was quite small. Not as dramatic as I had thought it would be. Another thing that blew my mind was that they fermented all the beer at 66-68F. Even the lagers. I tried the Cal Common wort with the various yeasts and the best one was the Mexican Lager. Claresta thought so too. Crazy that the best beer was a lager fermented at ale temps. Makes me wonder if either all this fuss about keeping the lagers cold is overrated or if Mexi Lager is just the bomb diggity.

After we sampled we took a tour of the lab. Here's the other thing that surprises me. This place supplied a crap ton of yeast to craft brewers and they exists in a very modest establishment in a nondescript industrial complex full of warehouse type looking buildings. They we pretty tight lipped about a bunch of stuff but it was cool to learn a little more about the place.

When we finished there we said goodbye to Clacob and went to Green Flash. This was recommended by Justin. We got there and had a beer and ate food. The burrito wagon that was there was great. I really wasn't a huge fan of the beer. I don't think Ellie was either. We took a tour of this place as well and found it very similar as Stone. The girl there was mean as hell. I haven't seen Justin in months and we would start chatting and she would get irritated. Whatevs. Mike Burton and Rob were there too. It was nice to see them.

Afterwards Ellie and I made the drive home which was tiring. That drive is too long for a day trip. I don't think we will ever do it in one day again. I guess Ellie and I are getting too old. We had fun though and I'm glad we went.